Measurement catalogs collate and provide detailed documentation of potential performance metrics. However, at present measurement catalogs only exist in a paper-based format that does not permit convenient updating.
With such paper-based metric catalogs, the process of identifying suitable metrics for monitoring a process is tedious, cumbersome and time-consuming. In particular, it is necessary to use complex and user-unfriendly paper sheets (which do not provide any guidance or support to the user regarding the selection of appropriate metrics). Indeed, the CMMI specification book is the only source of guidance to the user.
Furthermore, since CMMI process areas are not clearly understood, the relationship between the CMMI process areas and the business requirements of a user organization typically had to be manually adjusted. Finally, such previous methods of identifying appropriate metrics are not easily re-used in other circumstances. Consequently, a huge amount of time and effort must be expended using the above-mentioned prior art methods, to enable metrics to be selected for each new client.
When measurement catalogs have been implemented in electronic form (e.g. the IBM Application Services Management (AMS) Measurement Catalog) in the past, the definition of metrics provided therein have been typically insufficient. Furthermore, the relationships between the various components of computed metrics have not been clearly described.